The way our government works shouldn't be dictated by a small minority of irresponsible extremists in Congress who are willing to blow up our economy in order to get their way.

But when faced with an urgent need to fund the federal government to avoid a shutdown, House Republicans refused to simply extend governmental funding at current levels.

Instead, they gleefully took the entire economy hostage by insisting on a budget bill that contained a grab-bag of ideological demands and poison pills wholly unrelated to government spending. And they did this knowing that the Senate would refuse their ideologically driven demands.

We need to make sure Republican leaders hear Americans who want them to stop holding the economy hostage to their extremist ideology.